


Just Try

by queerofcups



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 15:15:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21940225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queerofcups/pseuds/queerofcups
Summary: They try and try again.
Relationships: Dan Howell/Phil Lester, Phil Lester/Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 21
Kudos: 95
Collections: Phandom Fic Fests Holiday Exchange 2019





	Just Try

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lestered (lgbtrobed)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lgbtrobed/gifts).



> Thanks lestered for the freedom to get a little creative. I loved the challenge of this prompt!
> 
> CW: The fic features Phil in an on-going, non-monogamous relationship with an original character. There's some fraught emotional complicatedness, but no cheating in this fic. 
> 
> A small playlist:   
> Black Kids - I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance With You  
> Cyberbully Mom Club - Drunk Text Romance  
> girl in red - i wanna be your girlfriend  
> Broken Social Scene - Anthems for A Seventeen Year Old Girl  
> VINCINT - Please Don't Fall in Love

_he don’t suspect a thing / i wish he’d get a clue_

  
“Ah!” Phil says, digging his fingers into Dan’s hair, tugging a little harder than he probably meant to. 

Dan hums a pleased noise around Phil’s cock, tonguing at the pulsing vein at the bottom of it, swallowing and swallowing. He closes his eyes. This is his favorite part, the culmination of all his hard work. And there’s nearly no one he can make come as quickly, or as well as Phil. 

He pulls away, wiping his mouth and crawls up on his bed to flop next to Phil. 

“Good?” he asks, poking Phil’s side. 

“Stop sounding so smug,” Phil says. He’s still pink. The color rises in splotchy rosettes on his chest and it’s all Dan can do not to coo and poke them. He’s done that before and it’d gotten him a pillow to the face. 

“I had to reciprocate after the stunning show you put on earlier,” Dan says, perhaps purrs. Self-satisfaction does make him a little shit, but he’s never going to admit that to Phil. 

“Someone was clearly a little pent up,” Dan goes on, trying to keep his voice neutral. 

He wants to know, he wants to know so bad. But if he sounds too interested, Phil will lose all of that loose-boned relaxation Dan’s worked so hard for. 

“Yeah, well,” Phil says and throws his hands above his head. “James is James, so.”

“I don’t know what that means,” Dan says, reaching up to tickle his fingers across Phil’s side, up to the very edge of Phil’s armpit, right before the hair stops. 

“Stop that,” Phil says, batting Dan’s hand away. “He just really likes doing the thing. He thinks it's funny.”

Dan is fully aware of James’ thing, where he riles Phil up-- gets him shaky and hard and wanting-- right before work and then sends Phil to Dan like some weird present. 

It’s weird psychological warfare. 

It’s definitely hot for all parties involved. James is apparently a master of teasing, judging from what Phil tells him and the state he’s in when he gets to Dan’s. And Dan never been fucked like Phil manages to fuck him after he’s had to calm down enough that he can be seen in public on the way to Dan’s. 

And there’ve been the instances when he couldn’t wait that long and Dan had talked him off, listening to Phil’s frustrated, turned on noises while James laughed softly in the background. 

It was really, really hot. 

It was also evil of James, one of three people who knew how Dan felt about Phil. 

“How is Jamesy, then?” Dan asks Phil and tries not to clench his jaw when Phil started in on how great James was. Dan already knew about the holiday they were planning, and the date to some fancy restaurant James had taken Phil on. But he was Phil’s best friend, it was his duty to listen to these things.

  
The whole dynamic hadn’t started out that way. Dan had really liked James, he technically still does. He was thrilled for Phil when the two of them started dating. He’d been even more chuffed when James and Phil agreed that while they weren’t totally open, Phil’s best friend bonus activities with Dan didn’t have to end. 

And James had made, makes, Phil really happy. Happier than Dan made Phil probably. 

Definitely happier than Dan made him. 

Somewhere along the line, in the year James and Phil had been dating, the refrain in Dan’s head had changed from happiness that Phil found someone to the horrifying realization that Dan wanted to be the person who made Phil the happiest. 

Phil, who’d known Dan so long that he could guess what Dan wanted for breakfast three days from now, didn’t notice. Dan did his best to keep it that way. 

James, who was as perceptive as he was tall-- and he was somehow taller than both Dan and Phil-- noticed immediately.

“He wants to hang out soon,” Phil says, yawning again. “Says he hasn’t seen you in forever. Can I use your shower?”

“‘Course,” Dan says and waits til Phil has rolled out of bed and disappeared behind the bathroom door to roll face down into the bed and scream into the pillow.   
  


_just text me in the morning / or whatever_

  
The party is in someone’s house. It’s dark and a little smokey. It smells like weed and there are people wandering around in packs of twos and threes.

This is the kind of thing Phil does now, since he’s met James. He goes to house parties with people who look like they might not have completed university yet. 

Admittedly, Dan hadn’t completed university, but that was because he chose to, not because he was too young to have graduated. 

It’s not like he and Phil were having sophisticated dinner parties or anything before James. They’d play video games and occasionally go out with their small solar system of age-appropriate friends. James was younger than Dan by a few years. Maybe if Dan wasn’t so enamored with Phil, he’d think it was weird, that someone like Phil was letting himself be so undone by someone who still hung out with friends from uni. 

“Dan!” 

It’s Phil who calls him over but he’s got an arm wrapped around Jame’s waist. Dan smiles through the clench of his chest. He walks over. 

These parties are impossible to tell apart. 

James smiles and nods at him taking a sip from his cup. 

It had been one of these parties, three or four months ago, that   
Dan had lost track of just how many drinks he’d had and ended up sitting on stone steps with James watching Phil float through the party. 

They’d watched him be weirdly, surprisingly good at parties, congenial and mischievous by turn.   
And Dan had sighed and told James how lucky he was. And James had turned to look at Dan and Dan realized, out loud, just how deep the pit of jealousy in his stomach went.

The next day was the first time Phil showed up at his flat, wild-eyed and annoyed, telling Dan that James refused to fuck him and insisted that he come to Dan for that. 

It’s months later now and Dan still doesn’t know if it was a peace-offering or James staking his claim. 

“Hi,” Dan says when he gets to them. 

He gives Phil the same brief hug he’s been giving him for years and turns to give James the same. 

“Glad to see you,” James says.

He and James hug one-armed because James refuses to let Phil go. 

“You too, Jamesy,” Dan says and steps back. “We’re having fun then?”

“Something like that,” James says. “You came just in time for the bands.”

Right. Because it wasn’t enough to be at a house party with a bunch of uni students, the best friend he’s in love with and said best friend’s boyfriend. Now there’d be a uni student on an accordion or ukelele or something equally ridiculous. 

And Dan would love it because Phil loves these things and he loves Phil. 

James catches Dan’s eye and raises an eyebrow. Dan doesn’t know James well enough to know what that means.

_i don’t wanna be your friend i wanna kiss your lips / i don’t wanna be your friend i wanna be your bitch_

  
Dan’s back hits the bed with a thump. There are hands, more hands than he’d counted before, stumbling over each other to undo his pants. There’s laughter. 

Dan looks down and James and Phil are nudging each other out of the way, both trying to undo the buttons of Dan’s jeans. 

Dan lets his head flop back down. Being drunk sure would make this less weird. 

He jumps and shrieks a little when they get his pants off and someone tickles their fingers up his leg, against his leg hair. 

“Sorry,” Phil says. 

“He’s not,” James says, “He’s a little demon.”

If Phil’s anything, he’s an imp, all devilish grins and big blue eyes he can pull into convincing innocence at a moment’s notice. 

Phil crawls closer, hovering over Dan’s crotch and Dan reaches down to hold his face fondly. Phil presses against Dan’s hand, then leans down to press a kiss against Dan’s pants, right on the head of his cock. Then he opens his mouth and nips it, gently, just a hint of teeth.

Dan hisses. 

“Told you,” James says and Dan looks up. He’s sat on an ottoman in the corner, half-shadowed. Watching, but removed. It sets Dan at ease, weirdly. This is the first time they’ve done this all together. And while Dan thinks James is fit, it doesn’t dispel the weirdness, or the nervousness Dan feels at the thought of seeing him and Phil together. 

“Hey,” Phil says and Dan’s eyes snap back to him. “Pay attention to me.”

As if Dan has a choice when Phil’s pulling off his pants and then Dan and settling on the bed between Dan’s legs and taking Dan’s half-hard cock into his mouth. 

Phil’s mouth of warm and wet, the ridges of his soft palate familiar. He swallows and his cheeks ripple around Dan’s cock. He makes eye contact when he lets Dan’s cock slip nearly all the way out of his mouth before dipping down and taking it in again. 

Dan sort of aches with how quickly he’s getting hard, blood literally rushing. 

He spares a last glance at James, who watches with a beatific smile. 

He doesn’t look at James again until a half-hour has passed and Phil’s turned him to rest on his hands and knees, facing James.   
“Look at you two,” James murmurs. He doesn’t look much different, smile still there and arms crossed, even though Dan can see the outline of his erection in his pants. 

“You two make a picture,” James says. Dan wants to be annoyed, but he’s too far gone to take it as anything but the compliment it is, another stream of pleasure. 

He thinks about saying thanks, envy doesn’t strip him of basic manners, but Phil’s finally done with the condom or lube or whatever is taking him ages to handle and is squeezing Dan’s hip and then pushing in with a long, confident roll of his hips. 

Whatever else James has to say is lost to the push and pull of Phil’s hips, the spread of Dan’s thighs and the way they fit together.

And when Dan comes it's the thunderous kind-- the kind of orgasm that strips him of sense, the kind that leaves him with a string of words and the sound of his own blood in his ear. It’s the kind that spreads his hips wide enough that his hips ache, his fingers clench in the covers, and his stupid, stupid brain offline.

He’s still saying it when he comes. It comes in breaths that are more like sobs, the declaration over and over-- I love you. I love you. Oh, I love you. Oh, oh, oh.

_park that car, drop that phone, sleep on the floor, dream about me_   
  


There’s nothing to grasp at. That’s the worst part. He’s not drunk. He’s not high. He’s naked and Phil is literally inside him, not even soft. And James is still there, watching them both. He doesn’t look angry. 

“Dan,” Phil says.

“Don’t,” Dan says, “Don’t stop.”

“Dan,” Phil says again. “We should.”

“I want it,” Dan says. 

And he does. If Phil stops, this moment is over and they are on the other side of the declaration, the place where they have to make decisions.

But the is limbo, the moment before you hit the ground when the fall is just flying. This is what loving Phil should like, the angry spark of sensitive nerves, the freedom of refusing to let go of the moment he’s stumbled into.

“If you want,” Dan offers, “I want to keep going as long as you do.”

And Phil is a wonderful man, but he’s just a man and Dan’s saying yes. And maybe, he feels something too, because he keeps going, spurred on by the soft, high noises Dan keeps making. 

He doesn’t come with the same fanfare, just a softly grunted curse and shuddering hips. 

He pulls out and disappears entirely for a moment, silent and too far away to touch. Dan closes his eyes and lets himself relax onto the bed. He won’t be the one to break the moment. 

There are soft sounds. Phil padding across his bedroom’s carpet. A door opening. The soft sounds of kissing and then the door closing again. 

The bed dips and Dan jumps when a hand rests on his thigh. 

“James left,” Phil says. “He says he’ll see you later. He says he had a good time.”

Dan grimaces, glad Phil can’t see his face. 

“I don’t know what else to say,” Phil says. “You love me, huh?”

Dan considers if he could actually suffocate himself before Phil noticed. 

“That’s against the rules, you know,” Phil says. Dan huffs a laugh. 

All the rules they’d come up with years ago to keep this from getting complicated. All the rules they’d broken about meeting each other’s boyfriends and sleeping at each other’s houses. None of it had made things complicated. Dan had done that all on his own. 

“I want to try,” Phil says and stops. He waits and eventually Dan has to turn to look at him. 

His hair is a mess and his eyes are bloodshot, the way they get when he’s been up too late. Dan’s known him for years and years and he’s still jealous that James gets to see this version of Phil more often than he does these days. 

“With you,” Phil says. “James...he said he knew. He said he’s known.”

“Did you break up?” Dan asks, sitting up. “Fuck, Phil. I didn’t mean to do that. I know you really liked him.”

Phil shrugs, “We need to talk. Me and him. You and me. Maybe the three of us. I don’t know what we are, Dan.”

Dan doesn’t know which “we” Phil means, but the relief that he’s included in it shakes him.

Phil grabs Dan’s foot, squeezing it. 

“So we’re trying?” Dan asks.

“We’re trying,” Phil says. And when he smiles at Dan, Dan’s certain that they’ll make it, whatever that may look like.


End file.
